Warhammer 40: Shattered Steel Soul

Chapter 383 Blank Memory
"There is nature without bad things, but there is no nature without good things. If an unjust person suffers because of the loss of good things, it means that he still knows what is good, and he still has some good parts left."—— "The Book of Lorgar"

They were moving, lifting their legs and then lowering them; their hands followed the movements of their legs, rocking forward, then back, stretching to an angle, and then in reverse.

They walked past the soldier who was lying on his back on the bed in the medical room with his hands hanging on the side of the bed. One after another, they stood tall, like some kind of dark green tree with roots that can leave the soil. They stood numbly and silently around him. walk. The somewhat dusty floor of the ward spread out under their feet, bearing the marks of many uncleaned leather boots.

The soldier recovers from the effects of the anesthetic. He murmured a few curses in the customary dialect of the place where he was born, and tried to sit up, but failed. His arms shook feebly.

The soldier paused, "Does anyone...have a moment to take a look at my legs?" His uneasy voice spread to the surroundings, and part of it reached near his hands hanging on the edge of the bed. "They're not in place, and, by the Emperor, my damn back is probably broken."

The people walking around heard this lone voice, and they turned around at different speeds until everyone was facing the direction of the soldier. Then, those legs began to approach at a steady speed, and the drooping, blood-stained, soaked and stiffened hem of the dark military uniform, like a piece of moving rock, gradually approached the position of the soldier's arm hanging by the bedside. .

"No, goodbye, brothers, it's better not to use it..." the soldier said hesitantly, trying to retreat. He tried his best to lean on the small part of his body that he could move, and rubbed towards the head of the hospital bed. The uncontrollable arm hit the edge of the bed, making a slight thud.

Others continue to approach as if this is a continuation of instinct rather than being manipulated by embodied consciousness. A bandaged leg came too close and touched the hanging arm. The blood from some broken wounds seeped out from the wet bandage and stayed sticky on the soldier's arm.

"No, what the hell is going on with you? Li De? Sur? Soraka? Don't...why are you staring at me? Whoever it is, say something!"

No one responded. Figures surrounded the soldiers one by one, attracted by the sounds they made, just like moths constantly entwining around the bright candles, standing silently in the silence.

At first, the soldiers resisted in fear and tried in vain to drive them away with words. Then, after a while, his words transitioned into mechanical repetition.

"...go," he said, "...leave. Leave me. You...leave."

"There's nothing worth seeing in the back, and certainly nothing in the front."

The flowing droplets slid down the head of the bed and soaked silently into the sheets. Time passed in the dark night.

"To describe things more pleasantly, this is the memory of the object." Morse said, "There is no emotion, and it will not be affected by the soul and will. The principle is probably to use the object as a lens held by the camera to capture images that occur over a period of time.”

The light is dim and the brightness of the room is further reduced. Outside the hospital wing, some lights were turned on, and the cold light stretched against the ground, shining on the edges of the arms. Above the hospital bed, the light bulb flickered when the circuit was briefly connected, and soon went out completely.

"Leave," he repeated the last few words of the previous sentence. Sometimes he said more, "You leave," and sometimes there was only the last combination of vowels and consonants, and some "ho ho" words. A gasping sound, similar to a damaged tape.

The craftsman said, his voice seemed distant at first, and then became closer in an instant.

The people around him left one after another, turning around at the same speed as when they came. The sound of footsteps and clothing filled the entire dark space again, and dust rose and fell quietly until all those who could walk had left the ward.

The darkness was pierced, torn from it like a frame, and the dim infirmary reappeared in front of the two Primarchs.

In the darkness, a dull collision suddenly sounded.

The glass bottle detached itself from its floating state and returned to Morse's hands. The sample sealed in the glass bottle seemed to have lost a certain unrealistic color, and surrounded by golden runes, it showed an inorganic dimness.

Perturabo immediately lowered his head and observed the body lying on the hospital bed. The former soldier has blended in with the pale sheets and yellowed pillows, revealing sunken and blackened bones under the rotting slurry. Apparently he had been dead for a long time.

Soon, the second collision came. After falling down, the soldier immediately repeated the action of getting up ineffectively, and fell down again after a few seconds. Because of the previous movement, his hard head hit the angle between the bed board and the head of the bed. The hospital bed shook violently.

The sound stopped.

"Of course, the drawback is that we can't read anyone's psychological activities. We can only see the impact Ran Dan has on their external performance." He continued to finish his words. As for the specific impact, he didn't feel the need to explain it in detail. In front of two Primarchs with superhuman minds, additional explanations were given.

-

boom.

The soldier raised his upper body and tried to leave the bed according to his established habit. His physical condition prevented this intention, so after the soldier reached a certain height, he fell back to the hard board of the hospital bed. His arm shook under the force, twitching nervously.

His arm stopped moving and hung stiffly in its original position until the soldier stopped talking and his breathing became slow and steady, as if returning to sleep, undisturbed by fear and pain, moving in a fixed manner like a biological machine. Rhythmic operation.

The third time, the fourth time... His actions were repeated again and again, and this was the only source of sound in the dark room.

On the other hand, after Morse accompanied Macado to handle a series of paperwork, he quickly developed a deep fatigue with the language exchange and handover of affairs in the work process, so much so that if there was even a bed here, it would still be called a bed. After cleaning, he wanted to sit down immediately - or lie down.

Perturabo pondered for a moment, thinking about the various characteristics of these transformed creatures and the deviations from their actual combat abilities.

Obviously, people affected by aliens have lost the ability to think to a certain extent during their lifetime, so their consciousness appears blank after death.

If creatures affected by Randan could only rely on their instincts in life, how could they have enough combat power on the battlefield to rival the Imperial expeditionary and defense fleets?

In addition, if Ran Dan's invasion is related to the nervous system and consciousness, what factors cause this effect? If it was psychic energy, he believed that with Morse's tens of thousands of years of experience in using psychic energy, he should have cracked the mystery of mind control long ago.

"You said that their consciousnesses still exist." Perturabo said in a deep voice. Unconsciously, a solemn atmosphere was brought into the dusty room by the Lord of Iron. "Then, we Is it possible to take a look at the blank memory remaining in the conscious body? "

He turned his head, and the data cable fixed to the armor at the other end stretched or shortened with his movements. "What do you think, Aurelion?"

"The Emperor bless him, because he has not damaged the identity of mankind through betrayal and brought us the harm of rebellion." Lorgar murmured, nodding towards the corpse on the bed, and then smiled, the light covering the golden words Change quietly.

"I agree with your decision, my brother." He said softly and gently. The True Speaker always has endless patience and kindness when facing his brothers.

Morse nodded indifferently: "If you want to see it."

He made a ceremonial snap of his fingers, and the whole world seemed to change in an instant, but everything was fleeting. A blank memory ends before any information is captured.

"It's over," Morse said. "Guess how long I've stuffed you with memories, you two."

"I sense a hundredth of a second, Morse," Lorgar said. Perturabo blinked. A large number of redundant and invalid fragments were suddenly added to his external auxiliary data system, occupying a large amount of his external memory. He kept the data for the time being and checked the logs in the data system, and got an answer that surprised him: "One empire year?"

Morse shrugged. "That's what you need to see, Perturabo."

Perturabo was silent. From this point of view, Ran Dan's manipulations destroy personal consciousness so completely that they are irreparable and irreversible - or at least they can do this.

So, will the Astartes be harmed equally? What about the Primarch?

"There is no longer a human spirit in the demon's body," Luojia said sadly, making a sign of a cross on his chest with his index and middle fingers.

"I need to contact the communication base station," the Iron Lord said, "and send these information to Horus... Horus?"

"What happened, my brother?" Lorgar asked immediately.

The Lord of Iron sighed in displeasure: "This is war time, and they are still getting into disputes!"

"The Returned Son and the Emperor's eldest son?" Lorgar Violet's eyes showed clear confusion. "Why? Aren't they having a war meeting?"

"It's Ruth's fault." Morse said, the golden light in his eyes extinguished, "It's not because of anything he did, mainly because of his existence."

"Horus mentioned Leman Russ. Of course, he was smart enough to use the nickname 'friend who discovered the Second Primarch.' None of us understood the Second Legion, and Horus felt it necessary to On the premise of keeping the Legion’s disappearance a secret, ask Russ, the only one who is familiar with the missing original body, what his views and opinions are.”

"Leon, with some unique acumen, directly guessed that the unspeakable person was Russ, and started a debate with Horus about whether Russ had the ability to bring a primarch back to the Great Expedition queue. A series of discussions, and the topic gradually deepened.”

"They were quarreling over this?" asked Lorgar.

"No. Jonson restrained his temper," said Perturabo, unsure of the meaning of his half-hearted relief. "He walked away and returned to the Unyielding Truth alone, telling Horus that they would continue the meeting after he finished talking to Russ alone."

He read more information, looked through the dusty window of the medical room to where the Vengeful Spirit was docked, and continued: "There is still one Dark Angel left in the strategy room of the Vengeful Spirit. A warrior named Luther. Jonson trusts him."

"Because I had the honor of teaching the Primarch some things." Luther answered Horus Luperkar's questions when he was chatting with him. He stood with his back to the porthole of the Strategy Room, his black hair meticulously trimmed close to his scalp. .

He looks slightly older than the average Astartes, but the difference is not huge. This may have something to do with his age when he became an Astartes - fortunately he was not yet too old to undergo a full range of transformation surgeries.

On leaving the Strategium, the Primarchs each left a trusted person with Horus to facilitate communication.

At this time, Daniel, the leader of the Mulistan Order of Lorgar Aurelion, was standing aside with a silent smile, listening to the conversations of others. His skin bears scripture tattoos similar to those of his primarch, except that he uses black ink.

As for Perturabo, he placed a mysterious steel cube here, about the size of the Primarch's palm. It is said to integrate a series of functions such as recording, photography, computing, positioning, transformation, psychic confrontation, fire support, etc. Horus politely asked no further questions.

"What kind of teachings? Can you tell me about it?" Horus sat relaxedly on his spacious throne to reduce his natural pressure in front of the Astartes.

"Some techniques for using words."

"Writing documents?" Horus said, "This is really troublesome. None of my warriors like this job very much. Alas, so do I."

Luther looked like he was just recalling some hard times in his past.

"Not exactly, my lord, but... something like this. The Wolf King's warriors found me, and that's how I got the job."

"So you know some of the sources of the conflicts between them, right?" Horus's eyes lit up, and he shook his head slightly, "No, I won't ask. Leon definitely doesn't want me to know..."

He saw a line of text projected on the iron box left by Perturabo, and the words changed: "Perturabo said that he and Lorgar are coming back, so please call Leon too."

Luther nodded and left.

The Wolf God stood up, sighed with a headache, and examined the map in front of them. A bright red thread zigzagged deep into the star map, marking the movement track left by the Second Legion before it disappeared.

Around this line, several military-related signs were lined up in alternating sparse and dense patterns, indicating the military goals they needed to complete at these locations.

Just by looking at the current arrangement, Horus could already predict the long battle that would follow. It can last for years, and a critical mission poses an even greater challenge.

"You mean Duncan? He is a rational guy who pays great attention to the allocation of resources. Even the entire legion is as careful as he is and pursues excellence. No, unlike Ferus, Duncan does not have the drive to encourage competition. He also I'm very happy to make everyone live a better life - I haven't heard from him in the past two years, why do you suddenly think of him? "

The star language sent Russ's words, and the Wolf God sent his thanks.

"Daniel, come and see if you can accomplish these goals if you assign them to the Word Bearers." Horus said.

"Me?" Astarte was slightly surprised and walked over quickly.

"Yes, we are all people who perform our duties in the cause of mankind. Anyway, you have been serving as a tactical advisor to Lorgar, right?"

The Word Bearer smiled at Horus's praise, "Yes, my lord."

He observed the aeronautical chart: "I have no doubts about your arrangements, and it is difficult to make decisive suggestions. But just for the sake of my original body's hobbies, maybe he will be willing to take on more destructive tasks. He is very interested in the aliens." The behavior was extremely angry.”

"He doesn't show it - well, he never looks angry," Horus said, changing some of the tactical markings.

"These areas will be left for you to vent your anger. Please advise Luojia to control the time. After completing the initial goals, we need to meet here."

He put his five fingers together, and the hand with a gold ring on it was like the horn of a ship's bow, pointing to a narrow corridor in the center of the star map. The projected light weaved a network on his fingertips. The threads marking the territory occupied by Ran Dan were dense but fragile, as if they would collapse at the first touch and could not withstand the attack of the fleet.

(End of this chapter)